


Old Inside

by QueenOfTheQuill



Category: Chronicles of Narnia (Movies), Chronicles of Narnia - All Media Types, Chronicles of Narnia - C. S. Lewis
Genre: Gen, Mild Dissociation, The Problem of Susan
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-08-02
Updated: 2015-08-02
Packaged: 2018-04-12 15:46:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 538
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4485375
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/QueenOfTheQuill/pseuds/QueenOfTheQuill
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It was hardest on Susan, not that she let them know that. No, she'd get along just fine without them. Without Narnia.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Old Inside

It was hardest on Susan. Stumbling along at one age only to be shoved back into a younger body, a body she had long outgrown and forgotten. It was almost as cruel as falling into Narnia once more, still young, untried in their eyes, and unfit to rule.

 

A child.

 

She lost it again anyway, for good, and cried herself to sleep for weeks afterward.

 

She wondered why it was any surprise, then, that she tried to race forward, to finally have her outside match how she felt inside. Any chance of that ended when she fell back through that wardrobe, though. She was wrecked by the dissonance she felt.

 

So Susan tried to forget. Tried to pretend that Narnia was a dream and that the terrible, uncomfortable imbalance within her would fade with time. Tried not to wonder how the others lived with it.

 

She wouldn’t go to their meetings and she told herself it was because she refused to indulge in their games instead of the fact that she couldn’t be reminded of what she had lost anymore.

 

When Peter rang her to tell her of the strange man who appeared like an apparition during their dinner, Susan told him to grow up. When Edmund rang to tell her of their plan to steal the rings, Susan told him it would serve him right to get arrested for theft. When Lucy rang to tell her they were meeting at the train station to send Eustace and Jill off, Susan told her to stop playing pretend.

 

When the policemen rang to tell her that her entire family was dead, Susan didn’t say anything. She just screamed. She screamed and cried and dropped the phone, not caring if it landed on the hook or not. She wished she asked Peter what the man looked like, wished she’d reminded Edmund to be careful, wished she’d told Lucy ‘I love you’ before she slammed the phone down.

 

She wished she were dead too, but Susan Pevensie had already lost her entire world. She would not shatter because she had lost even more.

 

So Susan picked herself up off the floor and dried her tears. She fixed the makeup on her face and with it, built the mask that she hid behind. She fortified her heart like it was Cair Paravel and she never let anyone in. When she returned to school, she heard the whispers following her through the halls and gave no indication that she heard any of them. Eventually, the whispers changed. From pity about her family, they became warnings about her aloofness.

 

“Watch out for that one. Susan Pevensie, she is. She’s the most beautiful girl around, but she’s got a heart of ice.”

 

Susan let a small touch her face, one that didn’t reach her eyes.

 

 _As cold as the witch’s winter_ , she agreed mentally as she swept past. She was 36 in a 21 year old body, she’d lost her home, her dreams, and her family, and she had rendered herself alone in the world, but she took it all with the grace of the queen she truly was.

 

After all, once a king or queen of Narnia, always a king or queen of Narnia.

**Author's Note:**

> My take on the problem of Susan. I've felt for a while that she got treated unfairly by C.S. Lewis and that she's probably just trying to deal with losing it all.


End file.
